


How To Be Yours

by Nepenthene



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Bisexual Dean Winchester, Castiel is a Good Boyfriend, Dean Winchester Has Issues, Developing Relationship, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Human Castiel (Supernatural), M/M, POV Dean Winchester, Self-Esteem Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-12 15:00:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29886306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nepenthene/pseuds/Nepenthene
Summary: Sometimes, Dean thinks there’s something inside him that’s broken beyond repair.(Relationships are hard fornormalpeople. But Dean's never been normal, and in true Winchester fashion, that's not an asset.)
Relationships: Castiel & Dean Winchester, Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 8
Kudos: 46





	How To Be Yours

**Author's Note:**

> This came from a post I saw last Thursday, which I highly recommend you check out [here.](https://www.instagram.com/p/CK6lrLtHN2c/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link) @crxstalcas' art is so good, I love the bold lines of their style and the way they colour things. *sigh. Makes me feel things, obviously.
> 
> This started out as straight ~*pain*~, to which my buddy InkOfEmrys can attest, but I love my boys too much to hurt them like that and just leave it there. So I hope the ending leaves you feeling fluffy and warm on the inside; I certainly did when I finished writing it. :)

Sometimes, Dean thinks there’s something inside him that’s broken beyond repair. 

He doesn’t know how or when it happened, or even what did it in the end. Just that it is. He can guess, sure; he’s tried a couple of times. But all _that_ does is stir up a slew of old hurts, and that doesn’t do anyone any good. He has more than enough fresh pain to deal with without dredging all the old stuff back to the surface, too. 

He’s picked at those scabs enough. He needs to leave them be.

Cas’ body is warm against his back. Solid. His arms are wrapped securely around Dean’s waist, and he doesn’t say a word. He just lets Dean sit at the edge of the bed, silent, and holds him.

See, the problem is that Dean doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing.

The first time they’d kissed, the first time they’d stumbled into his room with their hands all over each other, he’d had a clear purpose. _Show Cas how you feel._ _Get him to make that noise again. Make him smile._ It was simple. Straightforward. Uncomplicated.

Then they were _together._ The carefully defined parameters of their relationship had changed, and it was like walking into your house to find that all the furniture had been rearranged while you were out. You recognize all of it but you don’t have the first clue where anything is, and your familiar spaces have turned strange and confusing.

That’s the grey area Dean’s lost in.

He’s torn, now, between craving Cas’ touch like a dying man craves water and having the very thought of him — curled up behind Dean, or idly playing with his hair, or pressing a kiss to his cheek — make his skin prickle with discomfort and uncertainty.

Desire, he understands. Love, he understands. (He thinks. He hopes. God, he _prays_ he does.)

Everything else is a mystery.

Sometimes he’s fine. Cas will stay the night, and Dean will wake in the morning to another body wrapped around his. And on good days, when casual intimacy isn’t a minefield he's stumbling blindly through, he’ll do nothing more than snuggle closer and brush his lips over the closest patch of skin.

And then there are the bad days. The ones where Cas wakes up alone, to cold sheets, if he ended up in Dean’s room at all in the first place. Or the ones where Dean goes stiff and wooden under Cas’ hands, paralyzed by his touch for no identifiable reason. Or the ones where he stumbles away from Cas, apologies and explanations he won’t be able to say swelling in his mouth, choking him into silence.

The worst part, though, is that Cas just takes it. He doesn’t get angry, isn’t hurt by it, doesn’t ask questions. He just _accepts_ it, and it drives Dean crazy. Why won’t he fight? Why won’t he demand an explanation? It doesn’t make any damn sense.

It’s not that he doesn’t want Dean; hilariously, that’s the one thing Dean doesn’t doubt anymore. He still _looks_ at Dean, still brings him coffee, still rambles about his weird niche interests, still lets Dean sit him down on the couch and show him whatever movie he decides Cas needs to see. But he never once questions the senseless unpredictability of this thing they’ve fallen into.

Dean had actually managed to ask him about it, one night. They were halfway through _Die Hard,_ and he’d been warm and drowsy enough that he’d looked down at Cas, tucked snugly against his side, and just whispered it to him.

_Why do you let me push you away?_

Cas had looked up at him, his eyes soft and blue and knowing. He hadn’t said the obvious; hadn’t said the three words Dean could see written all over his face.

That’s another sacrifice he makes for Dean’s benefit. It’s always another sacrifice.

 _Because sometimes you need to,_ he’d replied simply. _And I won’t try to take more than you’re willing or able to give._

Dean had pulled him closer, curled into him. Breathed in the clean smell of his hair.

_I don’t wanna cut you out._

Words had failed him, then. But Cas had just smoothed a hand down his back and hummed s _oftly._

_I know._

Here and now, the hot ache of frustrated tears throbs under Dean’s cheekbones. 

“I’m sorry,” he says quietly. Cas shifts slightly, lifting his cheek from Dean’s shoulder blade.

“For what?”

And god, Dean doesn’t… he can’t hold back the sad, hopeless little laugh that trickles from his lips. “For _this,_ for… for shutting down. I hate it. But I can’t help it, I don’t…” He screws up his mouth, bringing one hand up to cover his eyes. “I don’t know how to be yours.”

It’s a tiny, pained admission, and his chest is so tight with unvoiced sobs he feels like he’s going to crack a rib.

“I don’t need you to be mine,” Cas says gently, his arms loosening a little. “I just need you to be happy.”

Dean drops his hand from his eyes with a shaky exhale. He sits up, turning so he can look Cas in the eye. “I want to, though. You know that, right? I want this. I want you.”

Cas’ hands are resting light and undemanding on Dean’s hips, now, and his answering smile is full of more tenderness and adoration than Dean thinks he’ll ever deserve. “Yes. You don’t need to worry about that.”

He’s going to worry anyways— that’s kind of his thing. He doesn’t bother saying that out loud, though. He just puts his forehead down on Cas’ shoulder, turning further in towards him and hesitantly resting a hand on his leg. “I don’t know how long it’ll take,” he says to Cas’ grey t-shirt. “But I’m gonna try. I’m trying.”

Cas runs a hand through his hair, trailing down to rub at the back of his neck. “It will take as long as it needs to. And I’ll be here the whole time, Dean. You aren’t doing this alone.”

Dean can take some comfort in that, at least. He’s… he’s so tired. Of this. Of being hijacked by anxiety over stupid things, of not knowing how to resolve Cas, his friend, and Cas, his… his whatever they are. (He’s too much of a coward to put a name to it. He only knows what he wants it to be, and what it most definitely is not because he can’t pull himself together.)

But Cas’ hand is warm on his neck, his fingers firm. Dean slumps further and further into Cas’ chest as the minutes drag on, slowly breathing him in: the muted scent of that lavender soap he discovered a couple months back, and under that the soft, indescribable smell of his skin. He disagrees, but Dean still swears he smells a little like a thunderstorm: like ozone and the air before rain. Like something otherworldly.

“Can we go to bed?” he asks, so low and muffled against Cas’ shoulder he’s not sure Cas even heard it.

But then he feels the press of lips to the side of his head, Cas’ stubble against the shell of his ear; and at that, Dean manages a small smile.

“Of course, _ol hoath,”_ comes the whispered assurance.

And yeah, he might be broken. But Cas knows that, and he…

He loves Dean anyways.

So. Maybe that’s enough.

**Author's Note:**

>  _Ol hoath_ = Enochian for "my love" 
> 
> (Y'all can thank InkOfEmrys for that one, lol)


End file.
